Robert A. Martin rents a Hitchcock film at LeVideo in San Francisco on April 12th 2014. Martin was an extra in Hitchcock's last film Family Plot.

Robert A. Martin rents a Hitchcock film at LeVideo in San Francisco on April 12th 2014. Martin was an extra in Hitchcock's last film Family Plot.

Photo: Sam Wolson, Special To The Chronicle

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Charlie Chaplin's face on the wall at LeVideo in San Francisco on April 12th 2014.

Charlie Chaplin's face on the wall at LeVideo in San Francisco on April 12th 2014.

Photo: Sam Wolson, Special To The Chronicle

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One major appeal of Le Video in San Francisco is that the 34-year-old store has 100,000 titles, letting video aficionados come across such unusual items as this Betty Boop collection. Most of the city's video stores have already gone out of business. less

One major appeal of Le Video in San Francisco is that the 34-year-old store has 100,000 titles, letting video aficionados come across such unusual items as this Betty Boop collection. Most of the city's video ... more

Photo: Sam Wolson, Special To The Chronicle

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John Chester looks at some of the used films for sale at Le Video in San Francisco.

John Chester looks at some of the used films for sale at Le Video in San Francisco.

Photo: Sam Wolson, Special To The Chronicle

Le Video survives thanks to partnership with Green Apple Books

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A month ago Le Video, the 34-year-old Sunset District institution with 100,000 titles, was preparing to close, joining nearly every other San Francisco video store in the death-by-digital graveyard.

But it has a new lease on life in its current Ninth Avenue location, The Chronicle has learned, thanks to a partnership with Green Apple Books - another longtime San Francisco business that has survived in an industry disrupted by technology.

On Aug. 1, Green Apple will open on the lower floor of the building owned by Le Video. The video store will move upstairs, into a space roughly a quarter the size of its longtime location.

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For Le Video, the deal is a lifeline. But it's an expansion for Green Apple, which, like many local bookstores, has managed to weather the digital storm by tapping into the tastes and sensibilities of a sophisticated city that prizes locally owned businesses.

Compared with video stores, the independent booksellers that survived the rise and fall of the big box bookstores have done a better job leveraging consumers' visceral connection to their product and weaving themselves into their local communities.

That's one reason that while video stores are nearly extinct in San Francisco, there are nearly three dozen independent booksellers and no national chain bookstores.

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"The narrative that all bookstores are not doing well is not true," said Pete Mulvihill, one of Green Apple's three co-owners. Last month, the industry trade Publishers Weekly named the 47-year-old Richmond District bookseller Bookstore of the Year.

Loving books

Even as e-book usage grows, most "e-readers are first and foremost readers - and most love books as physical objects, whether it be reading to children or sharing them with others," said Kathryn Zickuhr, a research associate with the Pew Research Center who has studied hardcover and e-book usage.

While more than half of Americans have a handheld device for reading e-content, print readership remains stable, according to a January Pew study. Among adults who read at least one book in the past year, just 5 percent said they read only an e-book.

But the same isn't true in the video world. Netflix and Hulu are dominant, and more TVs now come equipped with built-in online streaming capabilities to pipe their content into living rooms. Plus, additional content is available through devices like Apple TV or Roku. Hundreds of Blockbuster stores have closed over the past year.

Making matters worse, consumers haven't expressed nostalgia for VHS, DVD or even Blu-ray the way they do for books.

Fortunately for video fans in San Francisco, a marriage of cultural brothers will help both stores.

Despite moving to a smaller space, Le Video founder Catherine Tchen said her shop doesn't plan to dump any of its inventory, which includes roughly 20,000 titles that have yet to be digitized.

"Never, no," she said, "but it will be a challenge."

Le Video won't just benefit from Green Apple's rent payments - it could get customers too, as the shops will be connected.

Le Video averages about 120 customers on weekdays, while Green Apple draws 500 a day at its Richmond District flagship store. Its new space on Ninth Avenue will be about 2,400 square feet, or about one-third the size of its main location.

For 4 1/2 years, Tchen has poured more than $1 million of her own money into Le Video to keep it afloat as its finances remained in the red.

But in March, when she almost didn't make payroll for the third time, she posted a note on Facebook that unless something happened, she would close the store by May.

"I have not taken a salary in 14 years," Tchen said from her home just outside of Portland, Ore., where she moved 14 years ago to have more space for her many cats and other animals. But since then, she had spent what was intended to be her retirement on keeping the store afloat "and I needed to be able to meet my mortgage, my health benefits."

An Indiegogo campaign for Le Video hit its $35,000 goal, thanks to a recent $10,000 donation from Daniel Handler, the author of the "Lemony Snicket" books. But that was a stopgap and the business needed more revenue. She anticipates that she will need to raise an additional $30,000 to $60,000 simply to prep the new space and make the move.

The new model for independent booksellers in San Francisco is simple: a 2,000- to 5,000-square-foot store in a neighborhood that gets a lot of foot traffic, said Landon.

"And it can't work in a shopping mall," he said.

Landon, who is also executive director of the San Francisco Locally Owned Merchants Alliance, anticipates the new Ninth Avenue location has the foot traffic to sustain both shops.

Shopping local

Over the past few years, Bay Area booksellers have led "shop local" campaigns that have brought more attention to local businesses, said Landon. Green Apple has done unique partnerships, like one with the dating site OkCupid, which used the bookstore as a meeting spot for events a couple of times over the past few months.

As they've survived the last recession, they've come to rely on an economic camaraderie. On May 3, for the first time, all independent bookstores in Northern California will host a day full of promotions and special events and sale items.

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